Tommy Hilfiger clothing is positioned as designed for people who prefer to lead an active lifestyle.
It is difficult to imagine a person who was at least a little familiar with modern fashion, but at the same time would not know the Tommy Hilfiger brand.
Since 1985, the American company Tommy Hilfiger has been manufacturing casual clothing for men, women and children, as well as shoes, accessories, home goods, watches and perfumes. A distinctive feature of this product is elegance, convenience, good quality and attractive price. Tommy Hilfiger clothing is positioned as designed for people who prefer to lead an active lifestyle. We can say that this is a classic of modern fashion.
The founder of the brand - designer Thomas Jacob "Tommy" Hilfiger - was supposed to follow in his father's footsteps and become an engineer. But he was much more interested in fashion. For some time he even attended the GST Boces Bush Campus, but then dropped out to try his hand at business. In 1971, the future designer with friends opened his own clothing store in the center of Elmira (Cheong County, New York), which bore the proud name of People's Place. Tommy earned money for the business on his own, working in his spare time in a store that also sold clothes.
Friends purchased goods for their store from several suppliers from New York. But none of them could offer anything that Hilfiger might like. It was then that he began to make the first sketches of his own models.
The start of the business was successful, but after 7 years of trading, People's Place did not go well and in 1977 the store closed. Hilfiger was then 25 years old. He moved to New York, where he began working with fashion brands, including Calvin Kleinwhile attending courses on commerce and the business side of the fashion industry. Tommy could have remained an ordinary designer, but he wanted to create his own company.
And 1984 was a fateful year for Hilfiger - he met businessman Mohan Murjani, owner of The Murjani Group, a textile company. Murjani's investments helped to establish a new brand. So, in 1985, Tommy Hilfiger Corporation appeared. Loud advertising did its job - the business went uphill, in just two years the company already owned 10 stores, in which there was a brisk trade. In 1989, the brand left The Murjani Group and Tommy Hilfiger, Inc. was founded.
The real success came in 1992, when Hilfiger presented his first menswear collection of his own, which delighted consumers and fashion designers alike. In the same year, the company went public. And in 1995, Hilfiger was awarded the title of "Designer of the Year", which he was awarded by the Council of Fashion Designers of America - CFDA. It was the first of many prestigious awards he received in his lifetime.
In 1996, the first women's clothing and the first Tommy Hilfiger perfume appeared. In 1998, an entry into the foreign market took place - the first store in the UK was opened. The brand is gradually winning the hearts of consumers around the world, Tommy Hilfiger clothes are worn by celebrities, businessmen, politicians and ordinary people. The company is gaining more and more attention by investing in advertising with stars and sponsoring various music festivals and doing philanthropy. The range of offered products is expanding, it begins to include goods for the home. It was a period of unrestrained development of the brand. Sales revenue reached billions.
But by 2006, things were faltering, and Hilfiger made the difficult decision to sell the brand to Apax Partners LLP, a private equity firm, for $1.6 billion. This caused a lot of negative statements from the press, but in general it had a good effect on the company's business. In 2010, it was sold again, going to Phillips-Van Heusen Corporation (PVH Corp.), which also owns such famous brands as Calvin Klein, DKNY, Michael Kors, Timberland and others. The deal was already worth $3 billion—nearly seven times what PVH paid for Calvin Klein in 2003.
Tommy Hilfiger continues to be one of the most famous brands in the fashion world today. Hilfiger himself no longer takes part in the management, but continues to develop new clothing designs, remaining the lead designer of a company whose revenues are estimated at billions of dollars annually.
PS Anyone who is interested in the history of Tommy Hilfiger himself and his famous company is recommended to read the designer's autobiography, which he called "American Dreamer: My Life in Fashion & Business" ("American Dreamer: My Life in Fashion & Business"), released in 2016 year by Random House.
